Last week a group of students from Tower Hill School put together a short video of their trip to Bucktoe Creek Cemetery. The students’ presentation honors the USCT soldiers who fought in the Civil War and were later buried at this cemetery.
Download the WMV file (Right click on the link and select “save link as”)
A number of media groups filed reports on the Pennsylvania Grand Review that took place in Harrisburg last week between November 4 – 7. “Saturday’s colorful parade touched everyone who saw it,” as Charles Thompson of the Patriot-News explains. The parade on November 6 included over 100 reenactors, which as Thompson notes, makes the Grand Review “one of the largest gatherings of U.S. Colored Troops reenactors anywhere.” “Recalling these soldiers now — at the onset of what surely will be five years of reflection on the 150th anniversary of the Civil War — underscores the value of their special role in fighting that war and the historic role played by Harrisburg,” as the Patriot-News Editorial Board observes. Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell also attended the event.
Altoona Mirror, November 15, 2010
“A group of veterans from across the state got their due homage Sunday afternoon… During a ceremony at Huntingdon’s Riverview Cemetery, five new headstones for Civil War Colored Troops veterans were dedicated after the original headstones became unreadable.” Click here to full article
Centre Daily Times, November 15, 2010
“Marking the 145th anniversary of that event, Sunday’s review in Bellefonte was one of several held across the state to recognize the more than 8,000 men from 11 black regiments who represented Pennsylvania in the Civil War. Of those men, 25 received the Medal of Honor.” Click here to full article
Daily Local News, November 16, 2010 (Chester County)
“Sunday’s event included re-enactors, such as the Bradbury Camp Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, Bill Vosselers’s Confederate Civil War Re-enactment, and a group of students from Cheyney University portraying two black Union soldiers…. During her invocation, the Rev. Delores J. Loper said that as she looked out on the ground before her, it was clear many had died so we could enjoy freedom.” Click here to full article
Delco Times, November 15, 2010
“Eden also serves as the final resting place for the most black Civil War veterans in Pennsylvania — possibly the most Civil War veterans of any color or creed in the state. On Sunday members of the 3rd Regiment U.S. Colored Troops Civil War re-enactors honored them with a rifle salute and wreath-laying as part of a 150th anniversary observance of the Civil War.” Click here to full editorial Also see this article about the event.
Meadville Tribune, November 15, 2010
“Inscribed on the stone is the statement of its purpose: “In Honor of the United States Colored Troops of the Civil War Buried in Crawford County.” Those memorials were dedicated during a special ceremony Sunday in Greendale Cemetery, one of 42 cemeteries throughout Pennsylvania that hosted public services to pay respect to the roles and sacrifices of African-Americans who enlisted and fought in the Civil War.” Click here to full article
After African American soldiers were not allowed to participate in the Union army’s Grand Review in Washington DC in May 1865, Harrisburg residents organized their own event on November 14, 1865 for those who served in the United States Colored Troops. While this earlier post provides an overview, several other newspaper articles offer interesting accounts about the event. “No day could have been chosen more propitious for the occasion,” as the correspondent for the Philadelphia (PA) Inquirer observed that November 14 was “one of the finest of this most pleasant Indian summer.” After Simon Cameron delivered a speech, letters from those who could not attend were read aloud. General Benjamin F. Butler explained that he had “witnessed…[African American soldiers’] bravery and good conduct on the battle-field, and, above all, their devotion and unswerving loyalty to the flag and government.” Even “when their offers of service in the beginning of the way were rejected with contumely,” George L. Stearns noted that they still “promptly volunteered at the call of their country when she needed them to help conquer a relentless foe.” Others used the event to argue for equal rights. “All constitutional privileges, all laws, all ordinances, all regulations of States, discriminating against colored men, must be made null and void,” as Senator Henry Wilson proclaimed. The event ended with “the John Brown Song,” which as the Philadelphia (PA) Inquirer correspondent described, “the assemblage sang…with great zeal.” You can also read more about the ceremony in an excerpt from Ceremonies at the Reception of Welcome to the Colored Soldiers of Pennsylvania (1865)
A recent article published in the York Daily Record featured a veteran who served in Company B of the 32nd United States Colored Troops. John Aquilla Wilson grew up in York County, Pennsylvania and enlisted in February 8, 1864. After the Civil War, Wilson’s granddaughter “recalled that they used to go to Gettysburg every year so he could participate in a parade that honored Civil War veterans.” According to reporter Teresa Ann Boeckel, Wilson “lived to be 101 years old [and was] one of the last surviving Civil War veterans in York County.” The full article is available here. You can read more about Wilson on the York Town Square blog and in Wilson’s profile on House Divided.
Check out the slideshow below of pictures from Bucktoe Creek Cemetery, which is located in Chester County, Pennsylvania. They were taken during the Rugged Conservation Weekend that took place on September 11, 2010. You can learn more about this cemetery at the Land Conservancy’s website.
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(Images Courtesy of Gwendolyn M. Lacy)
The Historical Society of Pennsylvania welcomes inquiries about potential donations. Please contact us first before shipping any material. We will then work with you to determine the most appropriate disposition of the material and to conclude a donation agreement.
What to donate
The Historical Society of Pennsylvania collects a wide variety of archival material related to the history of Pennsylvania and the greater Philadelphia region. HSP staff members will work with you to identify which materials are appropriate to donate. In some cases, HSP staff members may wish to see the material before it is physically transferred.
HSP collects both personal papers created by individuals and families, and records created by organizations and businesses. Types of materials that we collect may include: letters, diaries, account books, deeds, meeting minutes, scrapbooks, photographs, drawings, pamphlets, invitations, articles of incorporation, professional files, financial and membership records, legal documents, and others. For more information, see our official Collections Scope document and the more detailed Archives Department Collecting Guidelines.
HSP is especially interested to add to its manuscript collections’ strengths in the 18th and 19th centuries and to extend more recent documentation of the Philadelphia region’s changing diversity as reflected in:
Transferring materials to HSP
Please contact us before shipping any material, so that we can discuss the donation process with you and help you identify which materials to donate. You can then ship the records or papers to us or make an appointment to deliver them in person. In exceptional cases, HSP staff members may be able to pick up the materials.
To transfer ownership of the archival materials to HSP, we will ask you to sign a deed of gift. The deed of gift includes a brief description of the material donated and can be customized to address the individual donor’s needs. The donation becomes official once it is reviewed and approved by the Library Committee of HSP’s Board of Councilors. HSP generally does not accept materials on deposit or on loan.
Small cemeteries across Pennsylvania sometimes offer the only opportunity to see evidence of the African American lives that helped save the Union. Many of the neighborhoods and homes of nineteenth century black families in Pennsylvania are no longer standing. Often the documents and records of their lives have become difficult to find or might no longer be available. But the graveyards of Pennsylvania still hold poignant evidence of the men and their families who sacrificed so much for their nation. This section uses photographs, videos, and dynamic maps to help illustrate the power of these hallowed grounds.
Men such as Martin R. Delany, a longtime resident of Pittsburgh and the first black major in the Union Army, had life stories as inspiring as any in American history. Yet so many of the African American patriots of the Civil War era and their families remain unknown. Even Delany, who was one of the most extraordinary men of the nineteenth century –a doctor, newspaper editor, novelist, activist, army officer, and political figure– remains largely obscure. This section offers a starting point for the study of some of the great biographies in nineteenth-century America.
Company E, 4th USCT
Over 180,000 black men fought for the Union army during the Civil War. Most of them served in the United States Colored Troops (USCT) which came into existence after the Emancipation Proclamation finally provided presidential endorsement for the much-discussed proposals for arming free blacks and former slaves in what had become the great conflict over slavery. This section provides information on how to learn about the evolution and experiences of the USCT in places such as Camp William Penn (pictured above), the great training ground in historic La Mott (Cheltenham, Pa) where more than 11,000 black soldiers mobilized for service.
Using free tools from Google Maps, we have launched a dynamic new map of Pennsylvania’s hallowed grounds that attempts to chart the burial locations of black soldiers from Pennsylvania who fought in the Civil War. In particular, this map-in-progress highlights cemeteries that hold the remains of the 100 Voices, or representative figures being memorialized by the 2010 PA Grand Review initiative. For example, three members of the 100 Voices are buried at Midland Cemetery in Steelton, Pennsylvania —Lemuel Butler, Andrew Hill and Charles Henderson. Visitors to the dynamic online map will find photographs and exact GPS coordinates of their headstones (courtesy of Calobe Jackson, Jr.) as well as background information on these men. Each online cemetery marker also includes information such as photographs or videos (where available) of the cemetery and whatever additional background information might be contained within Dickinson College’s House Divided research engine or at the Pennsylvania Grand Review website. This particular Hallowed Grounds map is ongoing project that needs your help. Please feel free to contribute photos, videos, GPS coordinates (obtainable through smart phones or GPU handsets) by sending them to us at hdivided@dickinson.edu. Other Civil War Era-related dynamic maps, such as one concerning the Underground Railroad in Pennsylvania or Frederick Douglass’s childhood in Baltimore, have been posted here.